General
Population

Segregation

Mentally
Ill Inmates

Firearms

Misuse
of Electronic Stun Devices and Other Abuses

The treatment of inmates at Red
Onion State Prison, Virginia's first super-maximum security facility,
raises serious human rights concerns. (1) The
Virginia Department of Corrections is responsible for safely and humanely
confining all its inmates, even those deemed to be violent, disruptive or
to pose other security risks. Like many corrections departments across the
country, Virginia's has endorsed the confinement of purportedly dangerous
inmates in extremely restrictive, highly controlled facilities. Absent
thoughtful leadership and careful policies, the potential for human rights
abuses at such supermax facilities is great. At Red Onion, unfortunately,
the Virginia Department of
Corrections has failed to embrace basic tenets of sound correctional
practice and laws protecting inmates from abusive, degrading or cruel
treatment:

The Virginia Department of
Corrections (DOC) is assigning men to Red Onion who are not the
incorrigibly dangerous for whom super-maximum security confinement may be
warranted. Inmates who pose no extreme security or safety risk are
subjected to unnecessarily restrictive controls and are arbitrarily
deprived of the activities and freedoms available ordinarily even in
maximum security prisons. In a blatant effort to fill large super-maximum
security facilities whose capacity exceeds the state's needs, officials
are apparently planning to dilute even further the criteria for admission
to Red Onion and its newly-opened twin, Wallens Ridge State Prison.

Prison staff use force
unnecessarily, excessively, and dangerously. Inmates are fired at with
shotguns and have been injured for minor misconduct, non-threatening
errors, or just behavior that guards have misinterpreted. These inmate
actions should and in most other prisons would be handled by staff without
weapons. Although physical force is never justifiable as punishment,
inmates at Red Onion report staff's punitive use of electric shock stun
devices.

Conditions at the facility are
unnecessarily harsh and degrading. General population inmates are confined
in their cells more than twenty hours a day. In segregation, inmates are
isolated twenty-three hours a day. All are subjected to remarkable levels
of control and forced to live in oppressive and counterproductive
idleness, denied educational, behavioral, vocational and work programs and
religious services. These conditions exceed reasonable security
precautions for inmates who have not engaged in chronically violent or
dangerous behavior behind bars.

Correctional officers and other
prison staff threaten inmates with abuse and subject them to racist
remarks, derogatory language and other demeaning and harassing conduct.
Facility administrators and supervisory staff appear to condone such
unprofessional conduct.

It is politically fashionable in
many places to disregard mistreatment of inmates and to assume criminals
by their conduct have forfeited all claim to public concern. Human Rights
Watch (HRW) believes the public and officials who are its servants should
not tolerate abusive treatment of prisoners solely because they have
committed crimes against others. As one inmate at Red Onion wrote to HRW,
I don't pretend that prisoners are saints. Most can be real idiots, but
their idiocy doesn't justify abuse, physical or mental. 2 We agree.
Inmates must be treated with respect for their dignity as human beings and
for their fundamental rights, whatever their crimes. Sound correctional
practice mandates such treatment, as it is essential to safe, orderly and
humane prisons. But it is also required by international human rights
treaties signed by the United States and binding on state as well as
federal officials.

Even if it is politically difficult,
state officials and elected representatives have a duty not to condone
abusive prison conditions. The concerns raised about Red Onion warrant
careful investigation and full disclosure. The public should be fully
informed about policies and practices at Red Onion as at any prison and
should be able to subject them to critique and debate. Unfortunately, the
DOC uses the walls of Red Onion to keep the public out, as well as
prisoners in. It routinely denies the press access to facility staff and
provides scant information about practices and policies there.

In March it denied Human Rights
Watch permission to tour Red Onion and to interview staff. The DOC claimed
that security considerations precluded it from granting Human Rights Watch
access to Red Onion. Security, however, has not prevented other state and
the federal corrections departments from permitting Human Rights Watch
access to their super-maximum security facilities. When pressed to justify
his refusal, Director
of Corrections Ronald Angelone simply asserted to Human Rights Watch
in a telephone conversation that permitting us to tour Red Onion was not
in the state's best interest. He insisted that since Red Onion was
operated consistent with state and federal law, there was no need for
scrutiny by an independent human rights organization. The
secretary of public safety, who has authority over the DOC, never
responded to our letter of February 22, 1999 requesting reconsideration of
Angelone's decision.

We believe Mr. Angelone interprets
the state's interests too narrowly. As detailed below, there are many
aspects of the facility that warrant public concern. Moreover, openness to
scrutiny, information-sharing and engaging in informed, constructive
discussions about policies and procedures are indispensable to continual
improvement of operations in corrections as in any other public endeavor.
The unwillingness to let Human Rights Watch tour Red Onion, coupled with
the DOC's notorious reluctance to give the press access to the facility
and its inmates,3 suggests the DOC is uncomfortable in letting the public
acquire a fuller picture of operations there.

This report reflects our attempt to
give the public some of that fuller picture about certain aspects of
conditions at Red Onion. Our description is based on communication with
inmates and their families, information from the DOC and from press
accounts and other public sources. Unfortunately, it is incomplete and
despite our best efforts may fail to reflect all conditions accurately,
because the DOC has prevented us from directly observing the facility and
has also refused to provide some of the information we requested. (4)

There is great potential for misuse
of authority and abuse in super-maximum security facilities. Informed and
principled leadership and oversight can mitigate these dangers. We call on
Virginia to demonstrate its commitment to respect international human
rights in the operation of Red Onion. Specifically, we recommend:

1) Use of Force:

The governor should establish a
committee of experts in the use of force in prisons who are independent of
the DOC to review use of force at Red Onion and to make recommendations
based on their findings. The review should include an assessment of
existing use of force policies, including the advisability and need to
have firearms within the prison perimeter; training received by staff in
use of force policies; the existence of adequate guidance for staff in
appropriate use of force; and the extent to which internal investigation
and disciplinary procedures are effective in controlling improper use of
force. The committee should also review each incident in which weapons
were discharged at Red Onion to ascertain whether the use of force was
justified. Results of the independent review should be provided to the
DOC, the governor and the legislature and the public.

2) Assignment to Red Onion

The DOC should not subject inmates
to more restrictive conditions than is reasonably necessary for their
safe, secure and humane confinement. Inmates should not be assigned to
Level 6 (super-maximum security confinement) unless they have demonstrated
that they are chronically violent or assaultive, present a serious escape
risk, have demonstrated a capacity to incite disturbances or otherwise
pose a serious and present danger to the orderly operation of a less
secure institution. Length of sentence alone should not be the basis for
assignment to a Level 6 facility.

Inmates who maintain good conduct
for one year (or a shorter fixed period) should be eligible for transfer
to a less secure facility absent particularized and serious security
concerns. Decisions to retain inmates at Red Onion should be reviewed by
central headquarters staff. If an inmate is retained at Red Onion, he
should be given the reasons for that decision and told of specific steps
he can take to secure a future transfer.
3) Public Reporting
The DOC should produce annually, and make available to the public, a
statistical analysis of inmates at Red Onion and their security scores.
For all inmates held at Red Onion who do not have the designated security
score stipulated in DOC criteria for assignment to a level 6 facility or
for whom the discretionary overrides have increased their security level
by more than one level, the DOC should provide a detailed explanation of
the reasons for placement at Red Onion (with inmate names withheld for
privacy reasons).

4) Segregation

Specific criteria for placement in
segregation at Red Onion should be established and communicated to
inmates. Decisions regarding placement in and release from segregation
should be reviewed by central administration staff to minimize the
potential for arbitrariness and abuse and to demonstrate the seriousness
of such placements. After a fixed period of good conduct, e.g. six months,
inmates should be released from administrative segregation unless there is
a specific finding, based on objective factors and following a hearing,
that the inmate continues to constitute a serious danger to prison safety
and security. If inmates are segregated for their own safety, they should
be provided the same privileges, programs and activities as general
population inmates.

5) Programs, Privileges and
Security

The DOC should carefully scrutinize
policies regarding programs and privileges and routine security procedures
for inmates to determine the extent to which the harsh regimen at Red
Onion can be ameliorated without jeopardizing legitimate security
considerations. It should implement a system of increased programs and
privileges and diminished security controls for inmates who maintain good
behavior. Programs should be implemented that will increase the humaneness
of confinement at Red Onion and that will promote inmates? ability to be
placed in a less restrictive facility and to adjust to prison life.
Educational, vocational, behavioral, substance abuse, religious and other
programming should be instituted consistent with legitimate security
purposes.

6) Mental Health

The DOC should establish policies
excluding from prolonged confinement in super-maximum security facilities
inmates who suffer from serious mental illnesses. It should review the
treatment of mentally ill inmates at Red Onion and take necessary steps to
ensure they are provided adequate care and that all inmates receive the
mental health screening and monitoring that is appropriate in extended
control facilities.

7) Staff Issues

Red Onion staff should be trained in
and continually reminded of the importance of proper, respectful treatment
of inmates. Abusive conduct and displays of racism by staff, including
derogatory remarks, should not be tolerated.

8) Public Access

Red Onion should be as accessible to
the public as security permits. Policies should be established to grant
the press, independent citizen groups and other members of the public
ready access to Red Onion?s warden to discuss conditions at the facility
and should facilitate their ability to quickly secure interviews with
inmates. Documents reflecting conditions at Red Onion should be readily
available to the public, even if disclosure is not required under Virginia
law. Information should be withheld only if its release would jeopardize
security and with names deleted to protect privacy interests.

In the mid-1990s, as part of a
massive prison building effort launched by then-Governor George Allen, the
DOC decided to construct two 1,200-bed facilities to house the state's
most dangerous criminals, inmates who require extraordinary security
measures. The first of the two identical super-maximum security facilities
to come on line, Red Onion State Prison, located in remote Wise County,
began accepting inmates in August 1998 and currently holds approximately
1,000. 5 Ceremonies to inaugurate its twin, Wallens Ridge State
Prison in Big Stone Gap, were held on April 9, 1999. Both facilities are
Level 6, the most secure in the DOC?s prison system. Little information
was ever provided to the public to substantiate the projected existence of
2,400 chronically dangerous inmates in Virginia. The idea of supermax
prisons was appealing?or at least tacitly unquestioned?in a tough on
crime? political climate in which parole was abolished and sentences
lengthened.

In constructing Red Onion and
Wallens Ridge, Virginia participated in a national trend. Across the
country, corrections departments have chosen to create special
super-maximum security facilities for the confinement of dangerous or
disruptive prisoners.

Traditional prisons have had cells
or units in which inmates who were repeat or very serious violators of
critical institutional rules could be isolated and segregated from the
general population. An inmate might be segregated either as punishment
following a disciplinary hearing (disciplinary segregation, in Virginia
called isolation) or segregated administratively as a management measure
for an indefinite period until authorities believed he could be safely
returned to general population (administrative segregation). Although
administrative segregation ostensibly is not a punitive measure,
conditions have been almost invariably as harsh and restrictive as in
disciplinary segregation.

Nowadays, segregation of inmates who
engage in assaultive, dangerous, disruptive or escape-related or predatory
behavior behind bars increasingly takes place in super-maximum security
facilities, of which there are thirty-six in the U.S., including two in
Virginia. Assignment to these uniquely restrictive facilities is
ordinarily not based on the inmate?s underlying offense but on his conduct
behind bars. Although conditions and policies vary somewhat from facility
to facility, their common characteristics are extreme social isolation,
reduced environmental stimulation, scant recreational, vocational, or
educational opportunities and extraordinary levels of surveillance and
control.
Proliferation of these supermax prisons reflects in part the belief of
some corrections professionals that they are necessary to prevent serious
misconduct by the worst of the worst? in their inmate population and that
concentrating dangerous inmates away from the rest of the prison
population makes it possible to provide safer, more secure facilities
elsewhere.

But supermax prisons also play a
symbolic role. Their highly restrictive nature is appealing in a
conservative climate in which retribution is the principal response to
crime. Unfortunately, this attitude can make it easy to uncritically
embrace harsh conditions and policies that are in fact not justified by
legitimate security needs or other penological purposes. It encourages or
condones supermax placement of inmates who do not in fact require such
restrictive controls for their proper management. It also can promote an
indifference or blind eye to abusive conduct and a failure to adequately
supervise staff and hold them accountable for abuse.

There is considerable debate even
within the corrections profession over the cost, cost-benefit, operating
and ethical/moral issues raised by super-maximum security confinement. The
constitutionality of supermax isolation and other extreme restrictions
remains unclear. 6 Super-maximum security confinement also raises
important human rights questions.7 Governments must respect the inherent
dignity and basic rights of all people, including inmates. The United
States has ratified international human rights treaties that are binding
on state as well as federal officials. These treaties, including the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the
Convention against Torture (CAT), prohibit the abuse of prisoners,
including treatment that constitutes torture or is cruel, inhuman or
degrading. Additional international documents, including the United
Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners (Standard
Minimum Rules), provide authoritative guidance on how governments may
comply with their human rights obligations with regard to prisoners. While
super-maximum security confinement does not automatically violate
protected human rights, it can if conditions are unnecessarily harsh, if
prisoners are unnecessarily subjected to them, or if periods of solitary
confinement are unduly long. Deprivations that are disproportionate to
reasonable correctional goals are inconsistent with the fundamental
touchstone of all human rights?respect for the inherent dignity of all
human beings. Physical abuse e.g. corporal punishment in the form of
beatings or unjustified violence?is prohibited in a supermax as in any
prison.

Red Onion houses inmates in both
general population? and segregation.8 Regardless of which category an
inmate is in, he spends most of the day in a small cell: general
population inmates spend about 140 out of 168 hours in a week confined to
their cells; segregation inmates spend 162? hours so confined. Inmates in
general population are held two to a cell.9 In segregation they are
single-celled.
The cells at Red Onion contain steel slabs with a thin mattress for a bed;
a steel desk and shelf and a toilet/sink combination. They have solid
metal doors with tray slots for passing food and handcuffing inmates and a
piece of glass for viewing. The cells are configured so that inmates
cannot see each other from their cells. Communication of sorts is possible
by yelling. Each cell has a single narrow window that cannot be opened but
which allows some natural light to enter. Windows facing the parking lots
of the facility have been treated so inmates cannot see out. Inmates
cannot regulate the lights in their cells. The lights shine sixteen hours
a day. At night, they are reduced to a dim glow that is, according to
inmates, bright enough to read by. The two inmates in each cell in general
population share one electrical outlet.

Guards armed with shotguns are
stationed inside the perimeter of the prison. There are gunports
overlooking the recreation yard and in the housing units. Virginia?s use
of firearms is atypical: most states rely ?on higher numbers of staff as
their primary means of physical control, supplemented by a variety of
nonlethal weapons. (10)

Conditions for general population
inmates at Red Onion are remarkably harsh and restrictive, far more so
than at maximum security facilities. Inmates are stringently limited in
their movement, social interaction, access to programs and ability to make
ordinary day-to-day choices. Certain aspects of Red Onion are, however, an
improvement over supermax prisons elsewhere: inmates are allowed
recreation in limited groups and also to eat together.

General population inmates are
locked in the cramped cells twenty hours or more a day with another
person. Double-celling exacerbates the strain of living in confinement
most of the day and increases tension between inmates. Inmates find it
difficult to spend most of their waking (and sleeping) hours in close
quarters with a stranger. 11 The lack of privacy is unrelenting. The
men find it humiliating to use the toilet in the presence of another
person. 12 Double-celling is also inconsistent with the premise that
inmates at Red Onion are so dangerous or violent that they cannot be
safely confined elsewhere. If they are dangerous, how can it be safe to
confine them in a small cell with another person? We do not know if DOC
officials screen inmates placed in double cells to reduce the potential
for conflict and violence.

Inmates in general population are
allowed out of their cells, one housing pod at a time, to eat in the mess
hall. They are also allowed outside their cells in limited groups for one
hour of outside recreation in a bare yard with a basketball hoop and one
hour of indoor recreation daily. There is little or no athletic or sports
equipment. The recreation yard is supervised by officers armed with
shotguns. Inmates are also allowed to leave their cells three times a week
for ten-minute showers. The showers do not have curtains or doors; inmates
are thus forced to involuntarily expose their genitals to female staff as
well as other men when they shower.

Maintaining contact with families is
extremely difficult for prisoners at Red Onion. They are allowed two
fifteen-minute calls per month if the privilege has not been removed
because of misconduct. Telephone calls must be collect and are expensive,
posing a financial burden for the mostly low-income families of inmates.
Prisoners are allowed four two-hour non-contact visits per month. The
amount of visiting time is particularly meager given that most inmates at
Red Onion come from areas that are hours away. 13 Inmates and their
families visit in a small cubicle with a solid glass partition between
them; conversation is through an intercom phone. During visits inmates are
in leg shackles and waist chain, with one hand free.

Personal property is extremely
limited, and only small quantities of reading material are permitted in
the cells. Publications are permitted only with prior approval and only if
purchased from an inmate?s prison account. A family, for example, cannot
give their son a subscription to Time magazine. Prison rejection of
reading material is hard to fathom. One inmate has been denied Plowshares
newsletter, a Catholic devotional booklet Living Faith, and an alternative
newspaper, the New River Free Press. Incoming letters can be of any
length, but there is a maximum of ten pages allowed for photocopied
enclosures, which restricts an inmate?s ability to receive information and
maintain contact with the outside world. (14)

Inmates at Red Onion are denied the
group and individual programs and activities available in most prisons,
even though the DOC's policies acknowledge the importance of programming
at all facilities. According to Division of Institutions Operating
Procedure (DOP) 832, programming at Red Onion should promote inmates?
appropriate in-prison behaviors and coping skills and identify their
inappropriate maladaptive behaviors. Programming may have the result of
helping inmates develop positive, stable behavior records for eventual
transition to a lower level facility. 15 The policy identifies
appropriate programming to include anger management, substance abuse,
wellness, behavior management, impulse control, and basic academic
programming. Seven months after Red Onion opened, most inmates? days are
marked by forced idleness. The DOC told HRW in March that they were
working on developing programs.

Currently, the only educational
program available to inmates are GED ( high school equivalency) courses
over the television. There are no group religious services or activities.
Religious programs are also, apparently, limited to some television tapes.
(16) There are no vocational or skill training
programs. Indeed, the physical plant of the facility contains no space for
classrooms or workshops. Job opportunities are few, e.g., kitchen duty,
sweeping housing units, cleaning showers. After seven months, the library
is not yet operating.

Red Onion may lack programs because
Director of Corrections Ron Angelone is dismissive of rehabilitation: What
are they going to be rehabilitated for? To die gracefully in prison? (17)
Such comments may please part of the political spectrum, but they ignore
several realities. Many Red Onion inmates will not be dying in prison.
According to the Washington Post, one in five are scheduled for release in
the next ten years. (18) Rehabilitation
programs serve the DOC's mission of promoting safe and orderly prisons.
And, finally, rehabilitation is mandated by respect for the fundamental
dignity of each inmate?whatever his crime. (19)

Segregation is the modern form of
solitary confinement; segregated inmates are almost completely deprived of
the commonplace incidents and routines of prison life. In theory,
administrative segregation is not a punitive measure. In practice, it can
only be described as punishing. The more than 20020 segregated inmates at
Red Onion live in conditions designed to impose long-term social isolation
and restricted environmental stimulation. Their world is austere, cramped
and claustrophobic. Security procedures imposed on all inmates in
segregation exceed those reasonably necessary for safety; their real
purpose may be simply to intimidate and degrade. Prisoners? minimal
physical requirements?food, shelter, clothing, warmth are met, but little
more. The facility offers nothing but bleak isolation to encourage or
enable an inmate to return to general population or to enhance his ability
to live peaceably once he has.

With minor exceptions, all of a
segregated prisoner's waking hours are circumscribed within the four walls
of his cell. He is fed in his cell, the food brought on a tray that is
pushed through the door slot. He is allowed to leave his cell to shower
three times a week. And he is permitted one hour of out-of-cell recreation
five days a week. All the recreation is outside, rain or shine. Inmates
are not provided with (or allowed to use their own) gloves or hats in cold
weather nor to come inside early if the weather turns bad while they are
out. The recreation yard is surrounded by two-story-high concrete walls
and covered with a chain link grate. In an important departure from the
practice at many super-maximum security facilities, at Red Onion
segregated inmates are allowed to spend recreation period together three
at a time. This interrupts the otherwise unrelenting isolation. Inmates in
segregation are also allowed to leave their cells for visits.

Every time an inmate in segregation
leaves his cell he is subjected to extreme security measures. First he
must strip, permit a visual search of his body (opening his mouth, lifting
his genitals, bending over and spreading his buttocks), and hand his
uniform out the food slot to be checked. After dressing, he backs up to
the door, extends his hands through the cuff slot and is cuffed. Shackles
are then placed on his legs, and a lead is attached. Two officers then
escort the inmate to recreation, the shower or wherever he is being taken,
one holding the lead and one holding an electronic stun device (an Ultron
II) against the inmate's body. The cuffs and shackles are removed for
recreation and showers and then replaced to return the inmate to his cell.
These extensive security measures are taken even for inmates with no
records of violence and, apparently, will be utilized for however long an
inmate is kept in segregation, regardless of his good conduct. 21

Nurses employed by a private
contractor make rounds in segregation every day, speaking with inmates
through the cell doors to determine if medical attention is needed. A
visit with a doctor cannot be scheduled unless the nurse decides it is
necessary. If a doctor visit is scheduled, the doctor comes to the cell.
After a routine search and restraints procedure on the inmate the doctor
conducts the examination. At no time are the restraints removed, and the
examination is conducted in the presence of guards, precluding any
privacy.

The social isolation, the absence of
stimulation, that segregated inmates at Red Onion experience is profound.
For all but five hours a week they are cut off from all other inmates,
unable to see anyone other than staff who bring them their food or provide
escort service or the fleeting periodic visits of medical staff or other
prison personnel. There are no programs or activities other than the GED
course or religious tapes on television. Inmates who are literate can
read? if they can obtain books (there is no functioning library yet at the
facility). They can write letters. If they are able to afford it, they may
purchase a 5" (no bigger) television which can be taken away for
misconduct and a radio. Their visits are restricted to one visit per week
for one hour.

In many super-maximum security
facilities across the country, segregated inmates are able to acquire
additional privileges and freedoms through periods of good behavior or by
completing program requirements (e.g., anger management or substance abuse
courses). No such system exists at Red Onion. Inmates who maintain
perfectly clear conduct records at Red Onion are subject to the same harsh
regime as those who continue to violate disciplinary rules.

Social isolation and confinement in
a small space can be physically and mentally dangerous and destructive to
the persons subjected to it, particularly if endured for protracted
periods. 22 Even persons who are mentally healthy can be damaged or
incapacitated in segregation and can lose their ability to function in
ordinary settings, to govern their behavior and make positive choices, and
to interact with other people. Prolonged confinement in isolation can also
provoke symptoms usually associated with psychosis or severe disorders
including perceptual distortions and hallucinations, delusional states,
hypersensitivity to external stimuli, difficulties with thinking, and
panic attacks. Such symptoms can be provoked in healthy personalities, but
prisoners who enter segregation with preexisting psychiatric disorders are
at even higher risk of suffering psychological deterioration and
psychiatric harm. The periods of recreation with other inmates undoubtedly
offset the harm somewhat, but to an unknown extent.

Mentally ill inmates should not be
confined for prolonged periods in super-maximum security conditions,
particularly those that exist in segregation at Red Onion. The conditions
of isolation, enforced idleness, surveillance and control pose serious
risks of aggravating their symptoms and precipitating psychiatric
decompensation. 23 Although some mentally ill offenders are
assaultive and require control measures, much of the regime common to
extended control facilities may be unnecessary, and even
counterproductive, for this population, according to the National
Institute of Corrections. (24)

Inmates with serious mental illness
are nonetheless sent to Red Onion and are housed both in general
population and segregation. (25) Due to
the DOC's non-cooperation we do not have reliable figures on the number of
mentally ill inmates at the facility. One inmate told us that in his pod
of twenty-two men, three were on psychotropic medication, and he thought
at least two more acted in ways that, as a lay person, seemed to him to
indicate mental health problems.

Proper mental health screening and
monitoring are crucial for inmates sent to supermax confinement. (26)
It is our understanding, however, that no special mental health
evaluations are undertaken for each inmate sent to Red Onion. Nor,
apparently, is there monitoring that would permit the prompt
identification of new or exacerbated mental health problems and timely
intervention.

Treatment of mental illness at Red
Onion consists primarily of psychotropic medications. Once a week a
psychologist checks in on inmates receiving medication. Privacy and
confidentiality are nonexistent: the conversation take place at the cell
front, with guards and other inmates listening. The visits are generally
fleeting, consisting of a question "How are you doing, any
problems", and then the psychologist is on to the next cell. For
inmates in segregation there is no therapy other than medication. Although
placement in segregation is for an indefinite period and can last for
years, mental health personnel have told inmates that because ?this is a
behavioral control unit, there is no mental health treatment here.

Physical conditions and policies at
Red Onion were ostensibly designed with superpredators in mind violent,
incorrigible inmates who cannot be safely confined in less secure
facilities. Yet it appears that the DOC has diluted the concept of who
requires assignment to Red Onion. The DOC is in fact willing to send men
there who could and should be housed in less restrictive environments.
Every indication is that this trend will accelerate now that the state is
also trying to fill Wallens Ridge. Governor James Gilmore stated on April
9, 1999 that felons caught with guns who qualify for a five-year mandatory
sentence would be eligible for incarceration in Red Onion or Wallens
Ridge. Public officials in Virginia thus appear to be adjusting supermax
housing criteria not to reflect genuine security and management needs but
simply to fill what would otherwise be half empty, but very expensive
facilities.

A basic premise of contemporary
corrections is that every prisoner should be housed in the lowest security
and custody level suitable for adequate supervision and the protection of
staff, other inmates and the community. Indeed, the DOC operating
procedures provide that no inmate will be maintained in a more secure
status than that which his behavior, risk potential and treatment needs
indicate. (27) Ensuring that inmates are not
subjected to restrictions that are not reasonably necessary for safety or
security is cost-efficient and consistent with common sense and legitimate
correctional objectives. It is counterproductive to use supermax
facilities for inmates for whom lesser levels of control may be
satisfactory [when to do so] may deprive them of freedoms, education,
treatment, and work opportunities from which they could reap significant
benefits and which may subject them to pressures detrimental to their
physical and psychological health. (28)

Avoiding the unnecessary use of
supermax confinement is also dictated by fundamental human rights
principles. As stated in the Standard Minimum Rules, prisons should be
operated with ?no more restriction than is necessary for safe custody and
well-ordered community life. (29) To subject
inmates to extremely harsh conditions depriving them of freedoms and
privileges ordinarily available in prison without adequate justification
constitutes treatment that violates the basic dignity of inmates and their
right to be free of cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment. We do not
consider the DOC's desire to fill expensive prisons a sufficient
justification for sending men to Red Onion (or Wallens Ridge, for that
matter) if they do not otherwise require stringent controls.

The DOC instituted a new six-tiered
classification system in November 1998 and is currently reclassifying
inmates under the new system. (30) Level 6
facilities Red Onion and Wallens Ridge's are the most restrictive and
secure. Inmate custody levels are determined through a scoring system that
assigns points for such factors as history of institutional violence,
severity of current commitment offense, escape history, length of time
remaining to serve, and age, among others. According to the new
classification procedures, assignment to Red Onion requires a score of
thirty-four points or more. A discretionary override for certain factors
is permissible that would increase (or decrease) the security level.
(According to classification experts, discretionary overrides should only
increase/decrease a security level by one class.) According to the DOC?s
Institutional Assignment Criteria, the profile of an inmate classified for
a Level 6 facility is ?disruptive, assaultive; severe behavior problems;
predatory-type behavior; escape risks. (31)

Once an inmate has been sent to Red
Onion he can be confined there indefinitely. DOC classification criteria
provide that inmates must maintain at least twenty-four months with no
disruptive behavior prior to consideration for a transfer to a less secure
facility. (32) There is no guarantee, however,
that even maintaining clear conduct will enable an inmate to be
reclassified to a lower security level facility and to be transferred from
Red Onion. The decision is at the discretion of the warden.

The DOC has not publicly released
information on the statistical profile of the men who have been sent to
Red Onion. We have not seen, for example, any summary of the
classification results or other data on the institutional history and
security and custody requirements of Red Onion?s inmates. The DOC has
stated that approximately 50 percent are there because of their behavior.
We do not know whether those inmates have in fact accumulated the
thirty-four points required in the classification system or have
demonstrated that behind bars they are chronically violent or assaultive
or otherwise severely threatening to the orderly operation of less secure
institutions.33 The DOC has not indicated, for example, how many have
assaulted staff or inmates.

Several dozen men were sent to Red
Onion when the facility opened to serve as a work cadre providing inmate
labor. Although these inmates did not require Level 6 security, they have
nevertheless been subjected to the same restrictions as all other inmates
at Red Onion, and they do not have the privileges, freedoms, activities
and freedom of movement they had at their previous facilities. The DOC
told Human Rights Watch that it did not have a definite timetable for
removing these men from Red Onion and returning them to more appropriate
facilities, although this could possibly occur in the next few months. (34)

Based on Mr. Angelone's comments as
reported in the press, it appears that about half the population at Red
Onion has been sent there simply on the basis of a lengthy (eighty-five or
more years) sentence. We understand that men who enter the custody of the
DOC with lengthy sentences are being sent directly to Red Onion from the
receiving facility regardless of their security score. 35 We consider
this practice indefensible, particularly in a state in which lengthy
sentences are commonplace.

Mr. Angelone has stated, [F]or such
an inmate you don?t need to find out if his behavior is good or bad. 36
This view is not shared by most of his profession. Indeed, corrections
professionals know that many perhaps most inmates who have been sentenced
to long prison terms even for violent crimes are not management problems.
(Indeed, most inmates in prison systems are well-behaved; they want to do
their time and get on with their lives.) The usual practice in many
jurisdictions is to place inmates in the general population of maximum
security facilities if they have been convicted, for example, of murder
and have life sentences. They are then reclassified after a year or so,
and depending on their behavior may be transferred to less restrictive
facilities.

The decision to use length of
sentence as a basis for assignment to Red Onion is particularly difficult
to justify in the case of inmates who were already behind bars before Red
Onion opened and who have demonstrated by their actual behavior that they
are not violent or difficult inmates requiring the extensive controls of a
supermax. Yet we have received various complaints from inmates in just
this situation. One inmate with a life sentence, for example, had spent
six infraction-free years in prison only to be transferred to Red Onion.
One inmate told HRW that he was sent to Red Onion even though he had a
classification score of eighteen and had gone years without any
infractions. Another said he had been behind bars for twenty years on a
life sentence and had no record of violent conduct, yet he too was sent to
Red Onion. Another inmate told HRW he was sent to Red Onion even though he
had an impeccable institutional record. When he asked DOC personnel why he
had been transferred they merely told me because of the length of my
sentence (life plus fifty years) and also because I was an in-fill inmate.
In other words, they did not have enough assaultive disruptive inmates in
the prison system to fill Red Onion. They have lied to the public about
the need for these prisons in Virginia.

That Virginia does not have enough
inmates who have displayed dangerous conduct to fill Red Onion and Wallens
Ridge should come as no surprise. Virginia has never had a particularly
violent inmate population. In fiscal year 1997, the DOC had only 72
assaults on staff and 86 on inmates out of a total prison population of
28,034.37 The total beds at Red Onion and Wallens Ridge constitute 6 to 8
percent of Virginia's projected prison population. 38 We are not
aware of any DOC analysis that indicated such a high percentage of the
state prison population could reasonably be expected to need super-maximum
security confinement. On January 1, 1997, for example, Virginia had 852
inmates in administrative segregation, or 3.5 percent of its total prison
population. (39)

Before Red Onion opened, the DOC
retained a national expert in classification systems, James Austin, to
undertake a classification review of its prison population. The study
analyzed such factors as history of institutional violence, severity of
current and prior offenses, escape history, and institutional disciplinary
records. (40)

The study showed that while a
relatively large number of Virginia inmates have been convicted of crimes
that earn long sentences (in large part because of the abolition of
parole), few engage in institutional violence or escapes. According to Mr.
Austin, Virginia does not have a prison population with high levels of
assaultive behavior. It is the length of sentences that gives Virginia its
high proportion of maximum security inmates. 41 Austin's analysis
showed that only .9 percent of male inmates who had been in prison a year
or longer had prison histories of assault and battery with a weapon; only
.7 percent had escape histories. Only 1.6 percent would be reclassified to
maximum security because of institutional misconduct (as opposed to other
factors such as severity of commitment offense).

Traditionally, segregation has been
a punitive measure imposed for a set period of time, after a disciplinary
hearing, as punishment for misconduct. In Virginia, as in all other
states, authorities are increasingly utilizing indefinite administrative
segregation as a custodial management tool. Whether in disciplinary or
administrative segregation, the conditions for inmates are the essentially
the same.

Administrative segregation, however,
provides prison administrators with much greater flexibility, and
decisions to impose it are subject to little scrutiny from the courts.
Because of the potential for abuse and the hardship on inmates, it is
essential that careful standards and safeguards for the use of
administrative segregation be developed and applied. The DOC's segregation
policy does not enumerate clear criteria. It gives wide latitude to
facility administrators to determine whom they choose to place in
segregation, stating merely: ?Examples of inmates assigned to segregation
ordinarily include inmates presenting chronic behavior problems or those
who present a serious threat to themselves or to others.

They may be severe escape risks or
seriously aggressive individuals.?42 This statement would permit, for
example, the placement in segregation of mentally ill inmates as well as
nuisance inmates who are nonviolent but who repeatedly violate minor
rules. It is our understanding that placement in segregation at another
facility does not automatically mean placement in segregation upon
transfer to Red Onion. Similarly, prior placement in general population is
not a guarantee that transfer to Red Onion will be to general population
there. The decision about whether an inmate is placed in segregation is
made at the institution.

The DOC has not made public any
information on the profile of inmates in segregation at Red Onion. We are
aware of at least one inmate who does not meet reasonable criteria for
being confined in prolonged social isolation with extreme security
controls. Although a due process hearing is supposed to be held prior to
assignment to segregation?and inmates may apparently grieve segregation
decisions the lack of any clear criteria preclude successful inmate
challenges.

Segregation in Virginia is
indefinite. DOC policies provide no guidance on permissible length of time
in segregation. Inmates do not know what, if anything, they can do to
secure their release to general population. While the DOC?s operating
procedure mandates periodic reviews of an inmate?s placement in
segregation, it does not specify criteria for guiding the institution?s
decision-making process. Nor does it affirm the goal of safely
transferring inmates to lesser custody as soon as feasible.

During the first sixty days of
confinement in segregation at Red Onion, an inmate is reviewed once a week
by the treatment program supervisor who acts as the Institutional
Classification Authority (ICA). After that the review is every thirty
days. In practice, the ?review? consists of a brief meeting at the cell
door. The ICA makes a recommendation to the warden, who has final decision
over whether an inmate will be released to general population. Inmates
assert that they are not told and do not know what -- if anything -- they
can do to hasten release from segregation. Inmates in theory can appeal
the decision through the grievance procedure, but such grievances go
nowhere.

Ordinarily, prison inmates prefer
general population to segregation. At Red Onion, however, inmates find it
a close call. Inmates in general population are double-celled, the amount
of out-of-cell time in general population is not that much greater than
for segregation, and in general population inmates are exposed to trigger
happy guards. As one inmate wrote to Human Rights Watch, Frankly, in many
ways, it is safer to be in the segregation unit than in the so-called
general population. Inmate on inmate violence virtually does not exist [at
Red Onion]. Inmate on guard violence virtually does not exist here. Guard
on inmate violence is high.

Conditions in super-maximum security
prisons tend to foster unusually hostile relations between prisoners and
guards. The simple fact that prisoners have been labeled the ?worst of the
worst and are subject to extreme controls and have minimal and highly
structured interaction with staff encourages correctional officers to view
them in a dehumanizing way and to treat them more harshly.
The quality of staff in a super-maximum security facility is, therefore,
the single most important factor in ensuring safe, secure, and humane
operations. 43 In addition to personal qualities, it is important
that the facility have a diverse workforce with an appropriate racial,
ethnic and gender balance. Racial and ethnic balance is critical in the
minimization of anger, creation of perceptions of fairness, providing
equity in interpersonal dialogue with under-represented inmate groups in
the population, and maintaining cultural sensitivity. 44
The preponderance of inmates at Red Onion are black, and the staff is
almost entirely white, drawn from the rural coal-mining area in which the
prison is located. Many of the staff have family or community ties with
each other. They have had little or no direct contact with blacks before
beginning work at Red Onion.

We do not know what selection
process or special training the DOC has provided staff at Red Onion.
Inmates assert that many of the staff are respectful and professional. But
they also describe some officers as determined to show ?they can be badder
than we are.? These officers are quick to use derogatory terms and slurs,
quick to use force, quick to impose their authority unnecessarily and
capriciously. One inmate described to HRW the relations between staff and
inmates as follows: ?The guards are young?for the most part and possess
the mentality of juveniles?as do most of the prisoners and they are into
the macho mentality?as are most of the prisoners. The two do not mix
well.?

Tensions and misunderstandings
perhaps inevitably arise from a clash of cultures in which both black
prisoners and white staff hold misconceptions and believe in caricatures
about the other. But in a well-run facility with appropriate staff
selection, training and supervision, those tensions can be minimized and
kept from escalating into provocation, confrontations and violence.
Unfortunately, white and black inmates alike at Red Onion describe an
atmosphere of pervasive and blatant racism. Inmates claim that officers
routinely use such terms as boy and nigger. One white inmate told HRW that
an officer said to him, with reference to a black inmate with a reputation
for sexual misbehavior, What do you expect from a fucking nigger? Another
white inmate wrote to HRW that he had talked with an officer escorting him
about a shooting. He described the officer as so excited about being able
to shoot niggers...[H]e couldn?t wait to shoot some of them black
bastards. A black inmate wrote HRW the following:

One night...this sergeant on the
mid-night shift knocks on my door. He stated that he had found my baby
picture, and being that I was locked-up [in segregation unit] and my
personal property was badly handled I asked for it. What he revealed was a
computer like print out of a doctor holding a black male child by the feet
with a very large penis.

Another black inmate wrote to a
family member:

The treatment of brothers is inhuman
and words alone cannot explain it. Imagine, if you can, creating an
atmosphere of so-called criminals (mostly black) who is considered less
than human, who has no outside support to hear his cry. Place him in an
environment where he is governed by staff (all whites) whose only contact
of blacks has been though media propaganda etc.
A third black inmate describes staff-inmate relations as follows:
White guards constantly try to provoke black prisoners into physical
altercations by calling them boys, hollering at them to get their
attention, pointing the gun at their backs, threatening them. These guards
have shot more black prisoners, more warning shots for the least little
actions by black prisoners....

Inmates learn the role use of force
plays in the management of Red Onion as soon as they arrive:

When I was taken out of the
transport van I had two stun guns placed against my body and was told that
if I didn?t do what I was told, I would be shot from one of the gun posts
located throughout Red Onion. I was told by [a lieutenant], We will kill
you here, so don?t mess up.

To date, nobody has been killed at
Red Onion. But Red Onion is a facility that appears to be managed by
reliance on the continual threat and actual use of physical force,
including firearms, electronic stun devices, chemical sprays and
restraints. From the information available to us, it seems that physical
force is used unnecessarily and excessively at Red Onion. Inmates claim
that they are shot at, shocked with electronic stun devices, beaten, and
strapped down for trivial nonviolent actions, e.g., moving slowly on the
yard, yelling in the cells, refusing to return a paper cup. Instances of
use of force at Red Onion do not appear to reflect a realistic evaluation
of the actual need for a particular level of force. One inmate described
to Human Rights Watch the prevailing ethos at Red Onion in the following
terms: "You will do as you are told, when you are told, how you are
told, forever as long as you are told or you will be shocked, shot, beaten
or otherwise maimed, injured or killed, do you understand, Boy?"
Some of these use of force incidents occur under the pretext of addressing
legitimate security concerns but appear, in fact, to be calculated efforts
to punish or deter misconduct?neither of which is a permissible reason for
using force. 45 Similarly, we have been told of instances in which an
application of force is initiated for legitimate reasons but then
escalates to a level that is out of proportion to the objective risks
presented by the inmate. (46)

The use of physical force to control
prisoners is an inevitable part of prison administration. Sound and widely
accepted corrections principles sanctioned by law, however, mandate that
force be used only when necessary, and only to the degree necessary, to
bring an inmate or inmates under control or to restore order to a
facility. (47) The goal should be to minimize
harm to inmates and staff by using the least amount of force that will be
effective. Lethal force, in particularly, should not be used except as a
last resort, when less life-threatening alternatives do not or cannot be
expected to succeed and when there is an immediate threat of death or
great bodily injury or dangerous escape.

A well-run prison with adequate
numbers of trained and properly supervised staff and adequate policies
should not have to resort to physical force as frequently as appears to be
the case at Red Onion. The DOC has not released the number and kinds of
use of force incidents that have occurred at Red Onion since it opened. It
also refused to provide Human Rights Watch with a copy of its use of force
policies. We thus do not know whether staff at Red Onion are following or
ignoring DOC policies when they use force as the primary means of
addressing inmate misconduct. Statements by DOC spokesmen suggest the DOC
believes that at Red Onion breaking the rules any rule is sufficient
justification for use of force, including use of firearms. (48)
Such a discredited philosophy has no place in modern corrections.

Most states prohibit firearms within
prison facilities, even within super-maximum security prisons. As one
noted corrections expert has stated, While firearms are appropriate and
necessary in the perimeter towers to deter escape, firearms are neither
appropriate nor necessary within the prison yard, and are especially
inappropriate within...housing units...[T]he use of firearms within prison
walls increases, rather than decreases, the risk of serious injury or
death to both inmates and staff.... 49 Mainstream American
corrections has rejected the use of firearms within prison walls because
they are almost always unnecessary staff rarely need firearms to restore
order, even when confronting prisoners who are fighting. It is also
extremely difficult to shoot accurately at moving inmates, particularly
under intense or traumatic circumstances.

Virginia is one of three states in
the nation in which firearms are routinely carried or deployed within the
prison perimeter.50 At Red Onion, officers carry shotguns in the control
rooms within the housing units and in gunports overlooking the recreation
yard. The first shot is supposed to be a warning shot and is a blank. Live
rounds are then utilized. Red Onion officers fire rubber pellet stingers,
rounds which are considered non-lethal although they can inflict injury,
particularly if fired at close range or to the head. Inmates have claimed
but we have not been able to confirm that the officers are also equipped
with No. 8 birdshot. 51 Shotguns firing birdshot are considered
lethal weapons, even though birdshot is typically only lethal if fired at
close range.

According to the press, Red Onion
officers fired their weapons 63 times in the nine months since the
facility opened. 52 Ten inmates have been injured.

As of December, the rate of gunfire
was five times that of the rest of the state's prisons combined. 53
The DOC claims most of the shots were warning shots. Reports from inmates
and family members indicate that the level of gunfire may have slowed down
after widespread negative publicity in December 199854 but that the
frequency has picked up again. In March there were several incidents in
which weapons were fired.

Anytime a firearm is discharged in
the direction of a human being the potential for injury or death is
unleashed. Because of the danger, use of force policies normally require
that all reasonable means of apprehension and control should be exhausted
before even non-lethal weapons are discharged. At Red Onion, however,
officers discharge weapons in fairly routine non-threatening situations.
The use of force policy appears to be: if an inmate disobeys an order, a
warning shot is fired. If the inmate continues to disobey, the inmate is
fired at.
Inmates believe they may be shot for talking over the wall that separates
one recreation yard from another, for crossing the red line that is used
to mark areas of permissible inmate presence, for leaning against a wall,
for not moving quickly enough. 55 Whether true or not, this belief is
fostered by staff. An attorney who visited a client at Red Onion recounted
the following to Human Rights Watch : When I was being escorted through
the yard, the counselor noted some red lines painted on the concrete and
told me that, if any inmate crosses a red line, he is shot. She said that
as matter-of-factly as it she were telling me that they have lunch at
noon.

The DOC has acknowledged described
three instances in which staff fired shotguns at inmates during March
1999. According to press accounts based on DOC information, on March 5,
three inmates were fighting in a recreation yard; they ignored an order to
stop and ignored a warning round and further verbal warnings. The gun post
officer then fired a total of seven rounds at the inmates lower
extremities. On March 17, an officer fired at the lower extremities of two
inmates who were fighting in the segregation recreation yard who had
ignored verbal warnings and a warning shot. March 25, 1999 two inmates
were fighting in the recreation yard. After they ignored verbal warnings
and a warning shot, an officer fired a stinger round at their lower
extremities. The inmates then stopped fighting but refused to follow an
order to lie on the ground. The officer then fired another stinger round.
One inmate had superficial wounds; the other inmate had pellets lodged in
his face and had to be sent to a medical center. (56)

What is remarkable about each of
these incidents is the lack of any apparent justification for firing at
the inmates or for failing to use lesser means of force to resolve the
situation. Fights between unarmed inmates are commonplace, everyday
occurrences in prisons; across the country such fights are usually quickly
resolved through the simple intervention of unarmed staff. In the March 25
incident, the shots were fired not only to secure an end to the fight but
to make inmates who were no longer fighting lie down on the ground. Staff
in the yard could have intervened at that point (if not earlier) and
obviated the need for additional use of firearms. The incidents also show
how easily injury can result from the inaccurate shots that are almost
inevitable in a volatile situation.

We quote below from letters inmates
have sent us describing incidents which firearms were used at Red Onion (57).
In each case, there is no apparent justification for the force that was
used.

I witnessed another shooting
incident where the officer fired shots because inmates didn't go to their
rooms fast enough to suit the officer. During this incident after firing
the shotgun the staff then came in and picked at random people to lock up
for no reason. They proceeded to handcuff and shackle these inmates,
bodily carried them out by their arms and legs, took them to the pod next
door, threw them in the floor face first and beat, kicked and shocked
these inmates with stun guns. 58

Today, another incident happened
where there was again no probable cause to shoot their guns...D6-pod was
outside for recreation and playing basketball, the inmates were struggling
for the ball and one fell to the ground and all of a sudden [the officer
who was in the kitchen tower] shot his gun and stated they were fighting.
There were no punches thrown nor was there any inmate harmed and/or
bruised. Also the guard in D0-1 tower shot his gun just for the sake of
shooting.

The entire D-6 pod was outside for
recreation and [the officer] was stationed in D&C unit tower, he
called completion of recreational period, in the process of inmates moving
toward the unit, there were four and five inmates slowly moving from the
card tables, but they were off the white concrete platform and on the
grass moving to building D. All of a sudden [the officer] shot the gun and
then [an officer in another tower] sticks his gun out and shoots,
therefore two-three shots was fired simply because inmate were not walking
fast enough to their bldg.

I and another inmate were on rec
yard A-2&3 when an inmate on rec yard A-4, 5, 6 told us of an assault
that was about to happen against another inmate. About fifteen minutes
later we hear the assault/fight start. After ninety seconds to two minutes
we hear a gun fired. As you know the first shot is supposed to be a
warning shot. After the first shot no others are fired. We then heard
officers enter the yard and handcuffs clicking as the three inmates are
removed. When my rec time was over I was escorted back to my cell by [an
officer]. The [officer] told me they knew about the possibility of the
assault before hand and gave me an account of how it unfolded. He told me
that they waited to fire the gun until one of the inmates was down and not
able to fight anymore.
While there I was shot at, or let's say a shot was fired because I was
gathering my deck of playing cards. Instead of the 8:00 pm lock down it
was called at 7:30 catching us off guard.

[An inmate] was jogging around the
yard, he was wearing closed headphones with walkman listening to a
cassette while jogging. The order to move to the opposite side of the yard
did not come over any loud speaker or megaphone device it was a shouted
order from a gun port. The man never heard the order. The first shot
knocked him down. He jumped up not knowing why he was shot and was shot
again. No one's life was in danger. No staff or prisoner was threatened by
this man. In less than one minute he would have been on the other side of
the yard where other prisoners would have gotten his attention. The man
was jogging in a circle. Had he stopped, turned around, and jogged in the
opposite direction he would not have gotten to the other side of the yard
any faster! (59)

Inmates have also told Human Rights
Watch about the following instances when weapons have been used
unnecessarily:

An inmate was shot for refusing to allow himself to be cuffed and taken
from the shower. His ten minutes allotted shower time had expired but he
had not finished showering. He finished before the order to shoot was
given, but it was too late.

An inmate had an asthma attack in the mess hall. His roommate bent over to
help him. An officer started hollering although it was hard to understand
his words and fired his gun a couple of times. Everyone lay down. The
roommate was subsequently beaten and the asthmatic inmate kicked by
officers.

An inmate was in the recreation yard doing exercises. When the officers
called the end of recreation, the inmate was not finished his jumping
jacks and did not want to stop. Officers fired at him, although he was not
hit.

On the way to the shower a new arrival stopped to talk with an inmate in
his cell. The officer told him to move on. He apparently did not move, or
did not move fast enough, and he was shot at.

An inmate waiting for the doors of his cell to be opened got some tobacco
from another inmate nearby. An officer fired his weapon at him.
Two inmates were fighting in their cell. An officer shot at the door to
stop them.

Misuse
of Electronic Stun Devices and Other Abuses

Uniformed staff at Red Onion carry
electronic stun devices that give painful electric shocks either when
pressed to the body ( the Ultron II) or, in the case of tasers, through
fired darts. 60 Inmates have asserted to HRW that they have been
subjected to taser shocks when fully restrained and for a wide range of
minor misconduct that poses no physical threat, e.g. verbal insolence. As
alleged, the incidents suggest that electronic stun devices are being used
as punishment, rather than for legitimate control purposes.

One inmate told HRW that immediately
upon arrival at Red Onion in September 1998, he and other inmates were
told to strip and permit a visual body search, including by spreading
their buttocks. Female staff were present indeed one was taking a video of
the proceedings?and the inmate was reluctant to do as ordered in front of
them. A captain shot him with the taser in the presence of the warden,
associate warden and a major. After the inmate had been tasered, the major
screamed in his ear, "Boy, you're at Red Onion now" and then
told the other officers to "get that nigger out of here." The
inmate filed a grievance because he felt correctly that he should not have
had to submit to a visual body search strip in front of female staff.

The inmate's grievance was denied.
The warden acknowledged that a taser had been used because the inmate
hesitated to strip and thus was failing to obey instructions. The denial
was upheld by the regional director without comment based on the
information provided. There was no effort to suggest that application of
physical force was warranted by any possibility of danger or that
non-physical efforts to persuade the inmate had been attempted and failed.
61 The use of the taser appears more likely to have been a
deliberate and malicious excessive use of force calculated to intimidate
new arrivals to the facility. (62)

In denying the inmate's grievance,
Warden George Deeds stated that post orders at Red Onion permit females to
work at any post in this case, assignment to the video camera. It is
widely recognized, however, that cross-gender strip searches violate
inmates' individual dignity and right to privacy. The warden?s policy at
Red Onion ignores basic correctional principles and international
standards prohibiting cross-gender strip searches unless in an emergency. (63)

Other examples of the use of
electronic stun devices that inmates have recounted to Human Rights Watch
include:

One man was shot with a taser while in his cell for refusing to return a
paper cup when ordered to do so. Restraints were then placed on his arms
and legs, securing and immobilizing him on his bed. (The use of four-point
restraints is discussed below.)

An inmate with a reputation for "pissing people off" was in his
cell when he told an officer that he wanted to have sex with her. The
officer tasered him through the food slot.

An inmate was tasered because he had his arm hanging through the food slot
and did not remove it fast enough when told to do so.
An inmate was kicking on his cell door because he wanted to make a phone
call. An officer came and told him to be quiet. The inmate said,
"Bring it on." Officers suited up for a cell extraction came to
the cell front and told the inmate to cuff up. The inmate complied. After
he was handcuffed, and while still in his cell, one of the officers then
told him to step back away from the door and shot him with a taser.

An inmate in segregation was kicking on his cell door and yelling. A
sergeant told him that if he didn't stop kicking they'd fix it so he
couldn't kick no more. The inmate kicked and yelled a bit more and then
stopped. A team of officers suited up for a cell extraction came to his
cell door and asked if he would cuff up. When he refused, the officers
sprayed him with mace and tasered him. They then entered his cell and
restrained him. The inmate claims that after he was on the ground,
handcuffed, and not resisting, he was shocked twice more. He was then
placed in a shower, which is the proper procedure after use of a chemical
weapon subsequently put in a strip cell with no mattress for twenty-four
hours.

In this incident, the taser was used as
part of a cell extraction, a use of force procedure in which a team of
officers forcibly restrain an inmate and remove him from his cell. Staff
at Red Onion as at any prison? are entitled to let inmates know that rules
cannot be ignored without consequence and to enforce prison rules through
disciplinary procedures. Cell extractions are security measures, not
disciplinary mechanisms, and they should be used only because of an
imminent serious risk to the safety and security of the institution. When
cell extractions are used to respond to relatively minor infractions that
do not present imminent security risks as would appear in the incident
described above?staff are simply inflicting physical punishment under the
guise of a security operation.

We have received a few complaints of
beatings at Red Onion. One case was brought to our attention by several
inmates: an elderly inmate reportedly threw a balled-up piece of paper at
one of the sergeants, striking him on his pants leg. That officer and
several others rushed into the inmate's cell and beat him so badly that he
had to stay at a hospital for a couple of days. Upon his return he was
placed in restraints. (64)

Verbal threats are reportedly
commonplace at Red Onion. For example, an inmate wrote to HRW that in
January, some inmates were verbally "disrespecting the nurse"
and she finally yelled loudly, "Shut the fuck up." Several
minutes later four officers came to the inmate's cell, told him to cuff
up, and then entered his cell. They pushed him down onto his bed, and one
of the officers stated that if I bothered the nurse again he will come
back and break every bone in my body and if I think he was lying look into
his eyes because he would eat my eyeballs out of their socket.

Inmates also claim Red Onion staff
abuse restraint equipment and strip cells, using them maliciously as
punishment even though such use is prohibited. Four- and five-point65
restraints immobilize an inmate on a bed. They should only be used in
extreme circumstances when an inmate left unrestrained poses a serious
risk of injury to himself or to others and when other types of restraints
are ineffective?and for no more time than is absolutely necessary. 66
Inmates assert, however, that staff at Red Onion place men in restraints
as retaliation for misbehavior, e.g. throwing juice on an officer. [E]veryone
here knows it's for punishment. They also assert that inmates are kept in
restraints for arbitrary time periods eight hours, seventy-two hours
regardless of the inmates? condition or the need for such control. Inmates
have similarly complained that strip cells containing no furnishings,
bedding or equipment are used as punishment. The degrading nature of
unnecessary strip cell confinement is heightened by officers? refusal to
provide toilet paper when needed.
When an HRW attorney met with inmates at Red Onion, the inmates had to
wear 50,000-volt stun belts even though they were shackled and handcuffed.
They were told that if they stood up the belts would be activated by a
remote transmitter. Prison staff felt the belts were necessary because the
HRW representative was meeting with inmates in a room without presence of
officers and with no physical barrier between her and the inmates. Given
the restraints on the inmates and the presence of guards immediately
outside the room who were watching the meeting through a window in the
door, the use of stun belts seems excessive. One inmate believed they were
used deliberately to intimidate inmates who were speaking with HRW. An
inmate who had wanted to meet with HRW did not because he was too upset by
the prospect of wearing the stun belt.

1.
Human Rights Watch has reported on prison conditions and assessed the
extent to which prisoners? internationally guaranteed human rights are
protected in numerous countries including Brazil, Egypt, Hong Kong, India,
Indonesia, Israel and the Occupied Territories, Japan, Mexico, Poland,
South Africa, the former Soviet Union, Spain, Turkey, the United Kingdom,
the United States, and Venezuela, among others.

2.
Throughout this report, we include information and quotes from
the more than thirty inmates whom we have interviewed or from whom we have
received written communications. To protect their privacy and to prevent
the possibility of reprisals, we do not attribute information to specific
inmates, nor do we identify any of our sources by name. We also do not
include the names of individual officers identified by inmates as having
engaged in abusive conduct. The purpose of our research into conditions at
Red Onion has not been to ?name names? or to document in detail individual
instances of alleged misconduct by staff but to alert the DOC of the need
to take more seriously its obligations to ensure humane conditions through
appropriate policies, staff supervision, and internal disciplinary
investigations and procedures.

3.
There was widespread media attention in Virginia to the DOC?s refusing
Human Rights Watch access to Red Onion. Shortly thereafter, the DOC
granted a reporter from The Washington Post the opportunity to interview
the warden and speak with some inmates there.

4.
A Human Rights Watch representative met with Gene
Johnson, the DOC?s deputy director of operations, and a representative
from the DOC?s legal staff on February 24, 1999. They were unable,
however, to give specific answers to many questions about policies and
procedures at Red Onion. The DOC responded to an initial document request
by passing on a few department-wide policy statements; other information
was denied, including a description of use of force policies and
principles and a profile of inmates at Red Onion. We have still not
received a response to a second request for documents sent on March 17,
1999 to Director Ronald Angelone.

5.
Seventy of the inmates are from the District of Columbia, pursuant to a
contract between the Virginia and District of Columbia departments of
corrections.

6
National Institute of Corrections (NIC), Supermax Prisons: Overview and
General Considerations, (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Department of Justice
(DOJ), April 1999), p.2. The National Institute of Corrections is
preparing a publication that will address legal issues raised by
super-maximum security facilities.

8.
We understand that the facility is also supposed to have
?transition units? but that many of the cells in the transition pods are
being used for segregation.

9.
The predominant view in the corrections field is that inmates
who are so dangerous or disruptive as to require being confined in their
cells most of the day should not be double-celled. Virginia, like some
other states, has nonetheless used double cells at Red Onion to save
expenses. This is ironic, perhaps, given that many question the need for
the combined number of supermax beds available at Red Onion and Wallens
Ridge.

10.
NIC, Supermax Prisons, p.14.

11. Some
inmates apparently pass on recreation simply to be able to have some time
alone without their cellmates.

12. According
to inmates, toilet paper is rationed: two people receive two rolls that
must last for seven days. ?If you run out you?re out of luck.

13. It
takes eight hours, for example, to drive to Red Onion from Richmond.
Roanoke, the closest city, is almost four hours away by car.

14.
In other words, an inmate can receive a hundred-page letter, but he cannot
receive a one-page letter with fifteen pages of photocopied material
enclosed.

15. VA
DOC, DOP 832: Programs, August 1, 1998.

16.
A Catholic inmate was denied access to a priest and the sacraments because
it was deemed a ?security risk?.

19.
The ICCPR requires the ?the reform and social readaptation of prisoners?
to be the essential aim of any prison system. ICCPR, Article 10(3).
According to the Standard Minimum Rules, prison systems ?should utilize
all the remedial, educational, moral, spiritual, and other forces and
forms of assistance which are appropriate and available, and should seek
to apply them according to the individual treatment needs of the
prisoners.? Standard Minimum Rules, Article 59.

20. We
do not have a precise figure for the number of inmates in segregation at
Red Onion. We have been told variously that the figure is anywhere from
200 to over 300.

21.
In some super-maximum security facilities, security measures are decreased
for inmates who demonstrate good conduct over a period of time. Carrying
stun devices during routine escort procedures is unusual and violates
international standards See Standard Minimum Rules, Article 54 (3),
?Except in special circumstances, staff performing duties which bring them
into direct contact with prisoners should not be armed. Furthermore, staff
should in no circumstances be provided with arms unless they have been
trained in their use.?

24.
NIC, Supermax Prisons, p. 13. ?Extended control facility? is another term
for ?supermax prison?.

25. DOC
policy permits the placement of mentally ill inmates in Level 6 facilities
with the exception of inmates with ?severe? impairments. We do not know
how the DOC defines ?severe? in practice.

26. Human
Rights Watch, Cold Storage. NIC, Supermax Prisons.

27. VA
DOC, DOP 823-4.0.

28.
NIC, Supermax Prisons, p. 6.

29.
Standard Minimum Rules, Article 27.

30. Most
jurisdictions today have adopted objective classification systems by which
prison authorities determine, based on an inmate?s prior behavior and
other relevant factors, the level of supervision and control the inmate
requires. Length of sentence and even nature of commitment offense are
factors that are considered, but they are by no means the sole factors.
Indeed, although the public often is unaware of this fact, many persons
who have committed serious crimes and who have long sentences are not
dangerous or problem inmates, e.g., inmates who assault or prey upon other
inmates or staff.

31. VA
DOC, Institutional Assignment Criteria, October 1998.

32. Disruptive
is defined as conviction for the most serious disciplinary offenses, an
attempt at one of these violations or a pattern of convictions that
indicate ?significant suitability?. Ibid.

33. We
have noted a tendency in other jurisdictions with supermax facilities for
prison officials to use them for nuisance inmates, for inmates who commit
frequent but minor disciplinary infractions or others who do not
reasonably require such extensive restrictions on their movement and
activities.

34. HRW
meeting with Gene Johnson at the DOC on February 24, 1999.

35.
The security-level classification procedures and criteria issued in
October and November of 1998 contain a requirement that any inmate with
more than twenty years to serve must be classified to at least a Level 3
facility. DOP 823 823-7.1. They do not provide the for the automatic
designation of persons with long sentences to a Level 6 facility. VA DOC,
DOP 823.

38.
At one point, officials were predicting a total prison population of
40,000. Thirty thousand is now considered a more reasonable estimate.

39.
Camille Graham Camp and George M. Camp, The Corrections Yearbook, (South
Salem, NY: Criminal Justice Institute, Inc., 1997) Virginia had the
tenth-highest percentage of inmates in administrative segregation. The
national average was 2.8 percent.

40. The
DOC provided a copy of the classification analysis to Human Rights Watch
in response to our request.

41. Telephone
conversation with James Austin, professor, Institute on Crime, Justice and
Corrections, George Washington University, Washington, D.C. on April 14,
1999. According to the DOC's Offender Statistical Survey FY 1997, as of
June 30, 1997 Virginia had a maximum security population of 34 percent of
the prison system. The national average was 12.3 percent. The percentage
of Virginia?s inmate population in maximum security was the third-highest
in the country. Camille and George Camp, Corrections Yearbook, p.16.

43.
NIC, Supermax Prisons, p. 16. [S]taff should possess the characteristics
of maturity, intelligence and good judgment, and?at least for custody
positions?be physically capable of performing the rigorous duties required
of them. They should be even-tempered, consistent, and capable of
respecting diversity in the inmate population...a mismatch of skill,
experiences, interests, and temperament can negatively impact the
operation of the facility and can create a dangerous situation, [and]
hinder the adjustment of the inmates to difficult conditions....? Ibid.

44. Ibid.,
p. 17.

45.
Corporal punishment is prohibited by the U.S. constitution and
international human rights treaties. As a noted expert on prisons and use
of force has noted, however, Physical force applied under the guise of a
necessary security control tactic can be and is employed to circumvent the
constitutional prohibition on such physical punishments. Steve Martin,
?Sanctioned Violence in American Prisons, a chapter in the forthcoming
John May, ed., Building Violence: How America's Rush to Incarcerate
Creates More Violence (Sage Publications).

46.
One inmate speculated that much of the abuse of force is due to
inexperienced officers. As he wrote to Human Rights Watch: These
one-stripe officers haven't the experience with prisoners, and problem
solving is nonexistent. These guys are young and think they have a free
hand in the use of force because superiors will back them up. They are
looking for action and disregard any communication skills they may have
learned. I have noticed that older one-stripers get more respect from
inmates because they are not as cocky as the younger one-stripers and
don?t act as if they have to prove they are bad-asses. I often think that
the younger c/os [officers] come off as trying to be a bad ass because of
fear. They have been told we?re the meanest that Virginia has to offer and
they are scared.

47. e.g.,
Standard Minimum Rules, Article 54 (1), Officers who have recourse to
force must use no more than is strictly necessary.

49.
Declaration of Charles Fenton provided in Madrid v. Gomez. Fenton is a
retired federal warden and frequent expert witness for departments of
corrections defending against prison conditions lawsuits. In Madrid v.
Gomez, however, he was an expert for plaintiffs.

50.
California and Nevada are the other two. Firearms were introduced into
Virginia's prisons by Director Angelone, who before coming to Virginia had
been head of the Nevada Department of Corrections.

51.
The DOC has not responded to our April 9 inquiry regarding the alleged use
of birdshot.

54. One
inmate told Human Rights Watch: When the place first opened, they were
shooting a lot of inmates for petty reasons or no reasons at all and
beating up inmates right when they arrived. But there was some bad media
coverage on this place so now it's pretty quiet here.

55. One
inmate wrote to HRW, I have witnessed them shooting guns for no reason
other than someone did not respond to an order quickly enough to suit
them. In two months, in my pod alone...they have fired the gun three times
not one of those instances being to prevent or stop an assault.
56 Frank Green, 7 Fighting Inmates Fired On. Inmates have also
written to HRW describing these incidents.

57. We
have quoted verbatim the language used by the inmates, but have deleted
names and corrected misspelling.

58. Ibid.

59.
DOC's version of incident reported by Frank Green, ?Inmates, Critics
Question Firearm Use at Red Onion Supermax,? The Richmond Times Dispatch,
December 24, 1998. The inmate who described the incident to Human Rights
Watch noted that the press was unable to obtain a complete understanding
of what happened because the DOC would not let them interview the inmates
involved.

60. A
taser is an electrical gun that shoots darts up to a range of 15 feet. The
darts can deliver up to 50,000 volts and temporarily incapacitate the
victim. The extremely painful shock from a taser has been been described
as resembling being hit on the back with a four-by-four by Arnold
Schwarzenegger.Madrid v. Gomez, 889 F. Supp. at 1175.

61.
Copies of the inmate?s grievance and official responses are on file at
Human Rights Watch.

62.
Other inmates also described to HRW the treatment they received upon
immediate arrival at Red Onion, including being yelled at, threatened, and
shoved, all in an atmosphere calculated to impress upon them that they
were at Red Onion now.

63. American
Correctional Association (ACA), 1998 Standards Supplement, (ACA: Laurel,
MD, 1998), Standard 3-4186, p. 29. General Comment 16 to Article 7,
?Compilation of General Recommendations Adopted by Human Rights Treaty
Bodies, U.N. Document HRI/GEN/Rev.1, July 29, 1994. (So far as personal
and body searches are concerned, effective measures should ensure that
such searches are carried out in a manner consistent with the dignity of
the person who is being searched. Persons being subjected to body searches
by State officials, or medical personnel acting at the request of the
State, should only be examined by persons of the same sex.) Most courts
have recognized that inmates should be protected from unwarranted
intrusions on their privacy by guards of the opposite sex. See, generally,
Human Rights Watch, All Too Familiar: Sexual Abuse of Women in U.S. State
Prisons, (New York: Human Rights Watch, 1996), pp. 28-30 and passim. 64 Some
of the inmates identified the precipitating event differently, e.g. that
the beating followed the inmate's refusal to return a cup from his food
tray.

65.
Four-point: arms and legs are secured. The fifth restraint used at
Red Onion is a chest strap.